


Where are you going, Mr. Rabbit?

by Meatbike344



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Serial Killers, Attempted Murder, Blood and Gore, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Heavy Angst, Hitchhiking, M/M, Murder, Predator/Prey, Protectiveness, Rape/Non-con Elements, Road Trips, Stalking, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-13 04:34:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29770737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meatbike344/pseuds/Meatbike344
Summary: "Authorities are warning all travelers on the road to take caution. There is an active killer on the loose. Please do not accept any rides from any strangers and keep close to the cities..."_________________Fódlan faces an unknown terror when a serial killer slaughters six hitchhikers around the country; a suicidal young man with a troubled past seeks his death through the hopes of being 'consensually murdered'; a mysterious stranger with a dangerous smile pledges to show him the meaning of life with a road trip across the country
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 6
Kudos: 45





	Where are you going, Mr. Rabbit?

**The Fódlan Courier**

“ _ **From the Hand of the Messenger to the Lord of the Castle”**_

Fódlan € 5,00 – Duscur € 6,50 – Brigid € 7,00 – Dagda € 9,00

Edition 2XXX. Pegasus Moon

‘ **LOST BOY’ SERIAL KILLER STRIKES AGAIN: ANOTHER HITCHHIKER FOUND SLAUGHTERED**

_Derdriu, Eastern Fódlan (AP) – A sixth victim has turned in a brutal series of slayings of young male hitchhikers across Fódlan, located in the forests along the busy highways of the three regions. Authorities believe that the killer targets young men, ages 18 – 25, traveling along the road and requesting rides._

_The body was found in a shallow forest grave off Route 42 of Remire, discovered by two hikers in the early morning hours of 4 AM. “They were walking around until the dogs caught a whiff of something and went down this slope which was a mile off the main highway. They probably thought it was dead deer or something until they saw the sneaker poking out from the foliage. The rest is history,” stated Head Investigator Jeralt Eisner of the Federal Investigations Bureau._

_While there are still no suspects, authorities have noticed a pattern with all the victims so far stemming with the first murder back in the 5th_ _of the Garland Moon. The first victim, whose identity is still unknown to this day and simply referred to as “Ailell” due to the body’s location, was estimated to be around 19 years old upon death—pale skinned, blonde, and blue-eyed._

_The next few victims: “Gronder”, “Rhodos”, “Gloucester” were also young men of such characteristics. The victims were sexually assaulted before being strangled to death. The locations of the bodies were also incredibly shallow in nature, implying that the killer dumped them with the intent for discovery._

_Authorities plea that anyone caught walking around down any of the main highways and intersections avoid hitchhiking and to refuse all ride requests. Cameras have also been set up at major checkpoints in order to monitor for any suspicious activity and figures. Anyone with any information should reach out to the Federal Investigation Bureau immediately._

_~ &&&~_

“Need a ride?”

A singing, deadly voice from a crooked smiling mouth curled upward, pronounced at the corners until they were nothing but thin slits; his strong, pale arm held a single cigarette and he brought it to his parted lips where the embers burned brightly for a second before dying away in a soft hiss.

Smoke blew out in a gentle huff, transcending into the night sky in dancing streams of gray as his warm eyes hovered close and hungry, as though he had not eaten in days and was edging dangerously close to pouncing. Were it not for how he bore an oddly relaxed posture against the dark of his seat and the expression of mild amusement on his face, it could easily be assumed that such a dark hunger consumed him terribly.

Then again, Dimitri was terrible at reading people.

The young man became aware of himself, aware of how heavy his backpack was (stuffed full of water bottles, medicine, preserved foods, a sleeping back, tarp, string, and a flashlight), and aware of how utterly dark the entire area was around him.

The only thing that illuminated the path he stood on was the oversize pick-up truck whose high beams shot all the way down the forest road, revealing no end in sight, and the gentle hum of the stranger’s cigarette, still hung loosely from his smirking lips. Nothing but crickets in the thicket and a red night with black trees and a sleeping moon.

Dimitri closed his mouth and looked down to his sneakers—worn out from miles and miles of tracking, marked keenly with grime, dirt, and bits of dried leaves to the side. Suddenly he felt tired, the type of tiredness that could only come from days of travel and loneliness and awkward small talk with strangers at the gas stations where he bought food and water.

And questions: _where are you coming from, where are you going?_ He didn’t have the answers to them and was too tired to try and find some.

The stranger on the other hand, the first person Dimitri saw today of his long stretch, was the first to ask him a question he knew the answer to simply because only two options existed.

The minute that pick-up truck stopped at the side of the road and the tinted window rolled down, revealed a handsome man marked with soft, burning hair, a perpetual half smile, and laughing eyes that radiated both warmth and terrible, bottomless disdain— _how was that possible?_

Dimitri knew better. While he was young, he knew better. All children are taught in school not to respond to strangers, especially bizarre characters at night. Even his late father told him to never trust anyone who smiles too much because they always had something to hide.

And he saw it; how the stranger’s arm hanging out of the window and against the side of the car was curling ever so slightly—veins gently probing from skin and muscle as the fingers rapped gently along the metal; his eyes never left Dimitri’s, moving back and forth as the boy shifted nervously from the close scrutiny, somewhat tender, somewhat starving.

Impatience hid itself well, but the boy caught glimpses of her cruel face beneath the sardonic, friendly mask and knew better. He knew better.

And yet, when Dimitri did come forward, right through the veil of thin smoke and stared back at the redheaded stranger in the pick-up truck, all he could say—absently—was:

“Sure.”

A sudden malaise. The excited rush of blood from the arms to the head. How the eyes dilated for a second before laughing back at Dimitri in silent victory. And the tremble of strong, broad shoulders of a body already restraining itself from the hunt. Like a predator snapping every single muscle back into place before taking off after its prey.

Finally, the stranger grinned sharply and patted the side of the truck. He clicked his tongue, nodding towards the other side where the passenger side was; his eyes never left the boy, not once.

But Dimitri did not care, even as sirens screamed into his numb head and his own feet struggled to get up into the massive truck. He lifted himself up, shut the metal door—it locked with a distinct click, collapsed against the seat with a forthcoming weariness that struck him so violently, he could barely keep awake.

The stranger began to speak—his voice was _laughing_ at him, dripping dark with clear, amorous desire—a gloved hand slinked over and squeezed his thigh, long fingers imprinting gently into the white skin through worn-out jeans.

Such a quick move, lacking in an expected subtlety, and the message of want burned deeply into his flesh like a brand. Yet he could not blame this stranger, no doubt already having seen the end in his own sleepless blue eyes.

There was no need to court a corpse.

And Dimitri knew better. He already saw it in the stranger’s eyes as he did in many others he encountered on the road—the disease to take hold and tear apart. This they call blood sickness. Except he was trapped in Charon’s boat, going down the bloody river to hell, to death, towards an end.

The truck was moving, music was blasting, and the stranger—his soon-to-be-killer was talking in the sickly sweetest voice he had ever heard. Many did not speak to him in such a tone and he has the scars and welts to prove it. But this one did.

The stranger was kind in that sense.

So Dimitri lolled his head against the window, stared outside, and allowed that hand to slip further down until heat surged at the pit of his stomach. He then closed his eyes and wondered if this would be the day that he finally died.

_~ &&&~_

Dimitri came to dying a few times on his travels, so many close calls, which he quietly cursed himself allowing himself to slip away in the first place.

It was mostly from the ‘goodwill’ of strangers who offered him a ride or two, usually whenever the young man stopped at an off-side diner or even when he was walking down the long, sweltering road. Their kindness emerged like a radio’s white hum to his ears and while he immediately heard the dark urgency beneath their offers of shelter and travel, Dimitri never turned any of them down.

The boy always quietly accepted; he would climb into their cars and silently hoped that such strangers would take responsibility for his cowardice and perhaps finish when he tried to start—perhaps in a place where his bones would not inconvenience anyone and his flesh could simply return to the earth without a trace of his existence left over.

The bulking truck drivers, breaths heavy and hot with deadly passion, hovered over his naked form; his eyes are always dull, always centered elsewhere. His pale chest is flushed and each breath echoing from a hollow chamber out from his chapped lips. He knows the small, robotic sounds he is making is nothing but an anguished sigh—which further excited his executioners.

Their mouths watered and their hands—twice as big as his and enough to wrap around his throat, pressed eagerly into his hole until his eyes saw stars. Hungry beasts trapped him on all sides against the soft linens of the bed, violently impaling the poor boy on their fat cocks until his stomach bulged slightly and his guts were completely stained white and sticky.

They fucked him until the boy began to make small gasps and soft cries in the midst of his numbness. Their hands were always on his slender neck and he quietly prayed that they squeezed harder—hard enough until he drifted away from the height of their raping and never wake up. Many were close, especially the ones revealed flashes of their sinister nature

Tragically, the men would pass out before any of them had a chance to steal him away and Dimitri would just get up and leave in the morning; if they hadn’t killed him now, they probably wouldn't after. His body was marked for days, purple welts around his neck and hand prints on his ass, nipples, and inner thighs where they forced him open and split him mercilessly on their lengths.

Soon they disappeared only to reappear once more from the violence of another killer. Sometimes, the more impatient strangers would park their cars on the side of the road and take the poor boy right then and there.

Dimitri, silent as always, had his face and exposed chest pressed to the glass as his savior pounded roughly behind him—cock jack hammering into him until he came out with a whimper and decorated the seat in hot strings of his spent. The men would grunt out loudly and fill him up so hotly that it leaked out in small streams.

When Dimitri laid, half-passed out in the car, and completely covered in cum and black markings, the men would toss the poor boy on the side of the road and drive away in a cloud of dust. He always relied on the kindness of strangers to get by; none of them were kind enough to do him the favor of his want—some were close, but Dimitri’s still alive.

And he’s still wandering and searching.

Until he met Mr. Fox.

It was then that a small ebbing of hope was revived in the young man, in ways most unexpected to him.

From what Dimitri could gather, Mr. Fox was a killer. Was he the famed ‘Lost Boy’ killer he had been hearing about from different talks around the country? Dimitri hoped so.

And he knew Mr. Fox was nothing like the men he encountered on his travels, where the dark desire simply lingered beneath the surface and never fully breached—thoughts of murder, perhaps.

Thoughts of fucking him to death, dumping his body in the forest, and allowing the wolves to make the proper funeral rites. But thoughts were thoughts, and Dimitri knew that his past companions have never spilled such blood before.

But Mr. Fox was different.

Dimitri knew it the moment he stared into those eyes—like a cruel God’s, bottomless and eternally hungry. He smiled sharply like a salesman, all teeth perfectly aligned and white, and never wavered from this demeanor even when Dimitri refused to answer any questions.

Instead, in response to the young man’s quiet refusal to share his name, the driver slowed down the truck, leaned over, and breathed hotly into his burning ear with a laughing grin.

“Call me Mr. Fox, then.”

And that was how Dimitri’s thirteenth and final savior presented himself; a bit of a bow, a kiss to his hand, and a pair of eyes—swirling madly with desire, enough to even stir a corpse awake from their heat. Mr. Fox was a killer, one with experience, and chose his victims wisely: lost boys without a name or a past, meant to disappear permanently without a trace.

As though they never existed in the first place.

Mr. Fox eventually stopped at an off-road motel near the Garreg Mach Monastery where the vacancy sign blew out completely on the welcome sign; the overhead lights flickered noisily and the only staff attending was a half-sleeping old woman at the reception desk.

Dimitri quietly followed the handsome redhead to the desk, keeping his eyes lowered to his dirty shoes as the man paid for a single room in the farthest corner of the motel.

Mr. Fox’s smooth voice and relaxed posture gave no insight to the smoldering intent that Dimitri spotted traced all along his spine; His one hand was hooked loosely on the inner lining of his jean pockets as his other hand slipped over Dimitri’s sagging shoulder—so close to the collar that his calloused thumb brushed against the soft skin of the young man’s neck, right over his faint beating pulse.

The man took the keys from the lethargic woman, grinned foolishly as Dimitri, and led the quiet boy over to their hotel room, hand gently guiding him down the empty stretch towards his potential coffin. Dimitri not once said a word or even lifted his head to meet with the woman’s dull stare. All he could do is accept the kindness of others and hope that this would be the last of his toxic dependency.

Would Mr. Fox be so polite to him and give him that mercy?

Once the door shut behind them, locking in the succession of three metal clicks, Dimitri felt himself lower subconsciously onto the bed; Mr. Fox, surprisingly, lingered around the room though his eyes stayed faithfully glued to Dimitri’s curled up form. The heater in their room hummed with a low mechanical whirl—that was ever left was the comfort of passive, white noise.

“You’re a quiet thing, aren’t you? Didn’t even talk much when we were in the truck,” Mr. Fox murmured absently as he slipped over to the mini bar and peered inside; the man has eyes on the back of his head—he’s still looking at Dimitri, making sure the willing prey stays prey.

The fridge opened up and reflected fluorescent light in the man’s face; the side of his mouth curled up in a sardonic, pleased grin and he stood back up with a bottle of White Frost Vodka. Mr. Fox made a nonchalant sound as he opened the thing on the edge of the table and sauntered over to the edge of the bed.

He advanced like a victorious king, but slow and precise like a newly wedded lover; his expression was oddly gentle, if not patient as he sat down—not too close to Dimitri, but enough where he could reach over and run his gloved hand down the young man’s leg. He didn’t though. Instead, Mr. Fox briefly stared at the open bottle of vodka in his hands, strangely methodical, and then extended it to Dimitri.

“Why don’t you drink? Just a bit. It will soothe your nerves,” he ushered gently in a voice that implied that rejection was not an option. Mr. Fox’s smile came close to breaking through the fog of Dimitri’s mind, like rays of sunlight—but how deceptive he was, this eye of a storm.

Dimitri silently accepted the bottle and downed it without choking. He practiced and even made an effort to meet the redhead’s intrigued gaze as he handed the drink back, licking his lips dry. And Mr. Fox gave a slow, shuddering laugh, shaking his head in what Dimitri could only pinpoint was disbelief.

“Now then, would you share with me your name?” He asked, taking a sip of the vodka; his tongue traced over the snout of the bottle and he licked his lips, attempting to capture a taste too far away and yet so near.

Mr. Fox gently put the bottle down on the ground and moved closer, eyebrows raised, half-quizzical.

Did it matter if someone knew Dimitri’s name? That someone had a memory of him, even a killer like the eager hunter before him?

Dimitri was known as many things: the boy, the stray, the wanderer. Titles that will precede him and make him something of a legend in the mouth of the animal that kills him. But he won’t be remembered—he doesn’t want to be remembered. 

Instead, Dimitri shook his head and sat back further away from Mr. Fox’s hungry scrutiny. The redhead’s smile faltered slightly at this rejection, the faint drooping of the corners of his mouth, cruelly sad. His expression suddenly went cold and the man tore his dark gaze away from Dimitri, humming a bit.

“Well, if you insist. But we ought to call you something…” Mr. Fox raised his head, eyes twinkling like star beams, terribly possessed and manic. “I picked you up and everything. Fed you. Paid for the room. Least you could do is give me a name.”

“What’s _your_ name?” Dimitri braved quietly, unable to find his voice.

The stranger tilted his head, suddenly beaming to finally hear Dimitri’s voice after a few hours of silence.

“Well, I already gave you a name. Doesn’t have to be a real one. Just a name. I would like to call you something,” he explained sweetly.

“Does it matter? I know what you want from me.”

“Do you now? And what would that be?”

Dimitri stared right at Mr. Fox, challenging the predator’s feigned ignorance head-on with a weary, defeated stare. His arms dropped down to his sides, no longer protecting his heaving chest. And in that moment, it seemed like he was offering himself to the man—a sacrificial lamb presented upon the altar of a murderous God.

A flash of white glint across Mr. Fox’s eyes and his upper body went still for a brief moment before shaking a bit.

Finally, his killer smile returned—his gaze straight on Dimitri with the only gentleness being the exertion of outright patience all across his taut body. He slid closer and close, forcing Dimitri to retreat right against the headboard of the bed. And Mr. Fox kept smiling. He went real close to the young man’s ear, where his breath gently tickled against the skin, and he murmured:

“I can hear your heartbeat from here, little rabbit. I can see the blood rushing beneath your skin—it’s so flushed. I bet if I hold you with just the smallest pressure, you’ll mark up pretty good.” His voice had dropped to a hoarse whisper, somewhat vulgar, and hideously greedy. It was the sort of voice used to break dogs—absolutely cruel and eager.

Suddenly, Mr. Fox had pressed himself fully against the young man with his powerful, vigorous body and grinned. “For someone so beautiful to wander so freely into my arms, I must wonder what it is you intended. You must realize that you’re never going to get to your destination, sweet thing.”

The threat was clear; it rang true like a bell. And yet, even as Dimitri’s heart raced towards death and for the first time in a long time, even as he felt the stinging heat of fear—the oppression of _feeling_ scorching at the pit of his empty stomach, the young man returned Mr. Fox’s suffocating gaze and spoke his truth.

“You don’t know my destination,” Dimitri said, his voice still a weak murmur.

“Oh?” Mr. Fox arched a brow and leaned forward until their foreheads touched; vodka wafted between them and he smiled ruefully— _go ahead, speak, but I don’t plan on letting you go_ , “and where would that be?”

“Death.”

And the game stopped.

Mr. Fox immediately sat back and his mask fell apart like a wounded actor on an interrupted play. All smiles dropped, all attempts at the act of theatrical killing and slaughter sent astray with a single declaration. And for the first time, Dimitri saw not a skilled killer or a hunter in the heat of a chase but a man.

“Excuse me?” Mr. Fox asked in a soft voice; his eyes were large with a growing delusion, smoldering Dimitri with their utmost attention.

“You want to kill me. Then do it. I want to die,” the young man declared brokenly and fell back against the headboard.

Exhaustion left his body in waves and the long day of walking and riding had finally drained him of nearly everything; his eyelids fluttered in the soft take off of a butterfly’s and he watched Mr. Fox lucidly, waiting for the predator to bounce on him.

But it never came.

Mr. Fox blinked very slowly and hummed with a neutral sound before slowly sitting back, his fingers drumming methodically on his knees. The man’s dark eyes were still trained on Dimitri—still hunger as ever, but deeply hesitant as though he had just discovered that his meal contained poison. 

They stayed still, two Grecian statues so close to touching but never ever meeting, even as the centuries passed by and covered their marble forms in ivy and cracks.

Dimitri was waiting. The anticipation was killing him worse than the thoughts of his future execution. There was a despair to it all, a despair in his soul, and his only expression of grief was to beg his executioner to let the guillotine drop from the top. He made it all this way, from one motel bed to another—always secretly hoping that one of his executioners would be so kind and release him.

In the end, what stopped them? Was it his soft gentle tears that always stained the bedside? Or the after morning whimpers that loosened the tight fingers around his slender throat? The one thing Dimitri did not try was begging and as far as he knew, his meeting with Mr. Fox was fate.

The handsome stranger with a wicked smile, fiery hair, and smoldering eyes—the devil incarnate from the eternal flames, was the man of his dreams. Who better to take him away, soundless, as though he never existed in sight?

Suddenly, something cool touched his wet cheek and he realized that Mr. Fox was caressing him with his fingers. The man drew close, so close that he could smell the hot vodka from his smiling lips. In fact, the stranger was looking at Dimitri in a light he had never seen before; still hungry and grotesquely lustful, but the cruelty was gone in place of something akin to starving affection. Mr. Fox’s eyes glimmered darkly and he pressed his forehead against Dimitri’s, blinking back into life.

“Now, you’re a curious creature, aren’t you? I like you,” Mr. Fox cooed beneath his breath; his fingers coiled around Dimitri’s flushed cheek, possessive and strong. “Yeah...I think I’ll keep you.”

Dimitri’s heart hardly relaxed from this declaration. In fact, the young man started panicking wildly, his upper body shaking as though electricity was flooding through his veins. This was hardly what he had expected—not a rejection of his desperate plea but neither was it a release for him. Mr. Fox was not planning to let him go—this wasn’t what he wanted.

Not in the slightest.

“I-I don’t understand. You’re not going to kill me?” Dimitri muttered hoarsely.

“Well, it would be a lie to say that the idea hasn’t entertained me,” Mr. Fox hummed pleasantly like an after dream. “But it would be a shame to waste such an...interesting thing like yourself.”

“Please, just kill me. I promise you, I’m boring. I’m no fun.”

“Kid, if you wanted to die so badly, why don’t you just jump off a bridge?”

When Dimitri fell silent, Mr. Fox snickered and shook his head. It was neither disappointment or disapproval, but a kindling of sympathy. The man gripped Dimitri’s shoulders, thumbs rubbing at the back of his skin in small soothing motions until the boy’s shaking quelled.

“Let me guess: you want to die but you’re too scared to do it yourself. So you tempt all these lucky men into bed in the hopes that one of them is going to be the big bad wolf and eat you right up, hm?” Mr. Fox suggested plainly with his tone taking on a more grating, sinister tone even leaning forward with narrowed dark eyes and his hands clutching on both of Dimitri’s shoulders.

The young man whimpered, pained, and threw his eyes down to blink away his tears. Mr. Fox’s cold fingers coiled gently beneath his chin and forced Dimitri’s watery gaze back up, meeting with the blood-curling intensity of the stranger’s starving leer.

Mr. Fox had lovely eyes. Their color reminded Dimitri of the earth, the same soil that blanketed his father.

And Dimitri started crying.

“Now, now,” Mr. Fox stated quietly and gently lifted the weeping boy onto his lap, running his hands down his quivering back and through his hair. He placed soft butterfly kisses all along Dimitri’s wet face and cooed soft words of reassurement.

It was said that the cruelest predators were those who lulled their prey into a false sense of security. The one who kept shivering lambs close to their breasts—licking them, playing with them, even sleeping alongside them.

In the end, when the jaws of death slip so casually around the relaxed necks of their prey, the result was all the same—perhaps even more tragic for the fall of illusion was the end of sweet sanctuary. And reality showed her true bestial facade.

Dimitri buried his head in Mr. Fox’s chest and heaved quietly; he gripped the helms of the man’s jacket and peered up through a watery lens, so close to drowning that the only thing keeping him from slipping was the killer that held him.

“You want to die so badly?” The deep voice murmured against Dimitri’s face, half-laughing, half-solemn, and the young man peered up, sniffling. “Believe me, you would regret it the minute it hits you. They all do but by then, it’s too late to say no.”

“W-What hits me?”

“The life physically slipping away from your white, pretty body. Think of an incredibly potent vacuum sucking your breath away without any restraint—and you’re choking. You’re choking and wheezing and gasping as though someone is holding your head underwater. But there’s nothing you can do is just lay there and _feel_ it. Feel it leave your body.” Mr. Fox leaned forward, no longer grinning, no longer laughing, and his eyes had taken on a darker quality, eerily predatory and sinister.

The man grasped his hand so tightly around Dimitri’s wrist that he thought his bones would snap from the constricting pressure; the poor boy craned over and softly cried with a mew as tears collected in the corner of his eyes.

Mr. Fox leaned in suddenly, breathless and eager. “What an absolutely adorable sound. I wonder what sounds you’ll make when I wrap my hands around your pale neck and watch your pretty blue eyes slowly go white.”

Then the threat bloomed red.

The man’s large hands quickly coiled around Dimitri’s neck and forced him down on the bed. His thumbs probed against his windpipe and Dimitri could feel the gradual force pressing right down, his silent gasps turning into frantic huffs of breathing—his chest quickly rose and fell and all he could see was the grinning murder with a white grin right above him.

This was it. This was what he walked hundreds and hundreds of miles for. This what he hitch-hiked from the cold wasteland of his former city all the way down to hot summits of the south, sucking off and getting fucking by every near-violent Samaritan that came his way.

The times he was forced into the front seat of a semi-truck, straddling the lap of a heaving truck driver as he was roughly impaled on a fat cock—rocked into the dashboard as an explosion of sounds left his abused, cum-filled throat.

Dimitri wanted to feel again. He wanted to feel alive. He wanted to feel real and feel teetered to the earth until he could see again. He wanted to die.

This was all leading to that single, wondrous feeling. The explosion of the human experience spilling over until he could feel nothing more again except for that eternal absence.

Dimitri closed his eyes. He went limp in Mr. Fox’s kind, killing vice. And he silently counted down to ten, each interval for every shortening of his irritable breath. The slow count to when this long journey would be all over and he could finally sleep. He could finally forget.

But Dimitri never even got to seven.

When Mr. Fox’s fingers refused to press down even further, Dimitri slowly opened his eyes and stared into the white, astonished face of his soon-to-be killer. Mr. Fox gradually pulled away, his hands falling away from Dimitri’s delicate neck, and he shook his head with a pained laugh.

“You’re fucking seriously. Sothis’ holy shit, you’re serious. You want to die.”

“Y-Yeah,” was all Dimitri could say, blinking away the tears. He didn’t sit up, even as the larger man slipped off of him and sat on the edge of the bed with his head buried between his hands. He simply watched him from afar, shaking like a wet lamb.

Mr. Fox could only laugh, this hollow broken sound—inhuman and mechanical. He then buried his face in his hand and sighed out roughly.

“By the fucking goddess.”

“Please, I won’t struggle.”

“Kid, I don’t know how to tell you this,” the man started, looking at him straight in the eye, grimacing like the devil in mild irritation. “but I’m no killer. Hell, I only picked up you because you’re a pretty pale thing and I wanted a good fuck.”

Dimitri’s world crashed right before him; his chest tightened and he felt like crying. He did not know what he was crying for, simply that he grieved for something that would never come no matter how close he got to it. 

“A-Are you serious? Then what was—”

“I was only joking with that ‘killer’ earlier because I thought you were into that shit. Now I realize that I actually picked up a ticking time bomb,” Mr. Fox mumbled and rubbed the back of his head while looking down to the floor. “Never thought I ran into a kid with an actual death wish. Just assumed you were some floater trying to get to the big city.”

Dimitri had made an error. He made a mistake. So many miles and miles in deal with all matters of life that picked him off, grinning madly with ill-intent, only to drop his abused body off somewhere far away and desolate once they decided they were not going to cross that line, Dimitri was so sure he hit the jackpot with this one.

That Mr. Fox was the famed ‘Lost Boy’ killer that often stole poor hitchhikers away until they could no longer be heard. He had hoped through so many endless walks down the sweltering highway that one of the drivers that picked him up would be his angel of death. In the end, he simply struck another wall in his long journey and Dimitri was starting to get desperate.

“Then...can I go?” He asked softly. 

“No,” the man said immediately without a beat.

“But you said—”

“I know what I said. Look,” Mr. Fox turned over, a bit closer on Dimitri’s side until his hand graced over the latter’s arm in a strangely affectionate touch. The man, once so sinister and bestial, had shown him a small glimpse of his true face—the most kindest expression Dimitri had ever seen in his life.

The vigor had cleared from his eyes, showcasing nothing but warmth, and he smiled softly as if he were speaking to a child. “I can’t let you go on the good conscience that you’ll go out there just to find some rapist to kill you. No, you’re staying with me.”

“...But what if I don’t want to,” Dimitri muttered brokenly.

He sat up against the headboard and hugged his knees to his chest, still staring at Mr. Fox as though the man had just said the cruelest thing in existence. Everything was cold. Everything was bitter. And the kind warmth being exerted from the stranger was nothing short but an alien hostility to Dimitri’s watery eyes. 

Mr. Fox shook his head once again and stared out to the far wall of their dingy motel inn. After a moment, he turned back to Dimitri, suddenly more passionate and firm in his usually lax expression. “Listen, why don’t we make a deal.”

“A deal?” 

“Legally, I can’t prevent you from leaving because that would be a kidnapping. But, what if you come with me—come with me for three days. During that time, I will try and convince you that life truly matters and is worth fighting for. But if you’re still unconvinced by the time we get there, you are free to leave and...do whatever you wish, I suppose.” Mr. Fox’s brow arched. “How does that sound?”

There was a tightness in Dimitri’s chest that was never there before. A sickness that seeped in and stole away his lungs. Why was a complete stranger going out of his way just to talk him out his desires? What would be the whole point of this journey then?

It would all be for nothing—absolutely nothing. And yet, Dimitri could not find the words for refusal. There was something comforting in the way Mr. Fox regarded him.

Just like father. Just like mother. He could no longer remember their faces but he remembered the feeling that emerged whenever they looked at him. Touched him. To be loved so unconditionally.

Dimitri blinked slowly and spoke in a weak voice. “Why are you doing this?” He asked.

“Well...I guess you could say that I went through the same thing once. And...I was close. Very, very, very close. And I don’t want you to end up as some unknown body in the woods, another statistic for that nationwide serial killer that’s wandering around, slaughtering pretty boys like you.” The redhead sighed into his hand and closed his eyes. “That’s why.”

“...Just three days?” 

“Just three days. Just to the Tailtean Plains, which was where I’m headed to. After that, the choice is yours. And I will have no say to your decision. I promise.”

Dimitri bit his lip until he could taste blood and nodded softly. Mr. Fox chuckled in response and leaned in, pressing a soft kiss against the side of the boy’s head; he paused, a smile once again slitting across his face and upon the cool, shivering skin of the young man before him.

“I never did hear a name from you.” 

“I...don’t think it matters.”

“Yes, well, I like nicknames all the same. You remind me so much of a rabbit—shivering white with those big round eyes of yours. Mr. Rabbit seems so fitting so one such as yourself, hm?”

Dimitri closed his eyes and swallowed down his fear. “It’s whatever you want me to be. I don’t care.”

Mr. Fox hummed, bemused. He laid down beside the young man, strangely chaste and reserved in his movements as he wrapped a large hand around Dimitri’s wrist as if to feel his pulse. The quickening beat must have made him grin for he looked over to Dimitri and winked. “Well you better start caring, Mr. Rabbit because these next three days to the Plains are going to be _life-changing_.” 

Upstairs, someone turned on the radio, which screeched muffled white noise in the empty space of the motel: _another body of a hitchhiker was found, this time off the Interstate 42 by Garreg Mach Monastery…_

Dimitri allowed Mr. Fox to gently pull the blankets over them—a strong muscular arm thrown around his chest as if to keep him still, afraid that he might get up and dash out of the room once the predator fell asleep. Dimitri eventually closed his eyes to the coming darkness and prayed for tomorrow to never come. 

_Authorities are warning all travelers on the road to take caution. There is an active killer on the loose. Please do not accept any rides from any strangers and keep close to the cities..._

**Author's Note:**

> Will update soon! Been obsessed with Dimivain in a while and I'm a tad messed up so here's this hot pot. 
> 
> I have a [Twitter!](https://twitter.com/Meatbike344)


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